Getting What You Want From Your Relationship This Christmas [Diary of the Undateable]

I keep telling everyone the same thing over and over again – I don’t want anything for Christmas. Of course a girl can never get enough pajama bottoms, socks and assorted gift cards, and I wouldn’t necessarily be disappointed if Santa surprised me with a Marc Jacobs watch. One of the reasons why I’ve been mum about my requests is because I really don’t like asking for anything. I’m an Aquarius. One of our chief qualities is that we are stubborn as all hell. Hey, I just think life would be a lot easier if people could read my mind. But it’s a problem that I’m desperately trying to fix before it affects my career and my fledgling love life.

In my limited scope of experience, saying what I want from a guy to a guy isn’t that easy. This year, if I wanted someone to call rather than text, or if I wanted him to take me out on a date instead of coming over to “chill,” I’d never verbalize it…I’d just artfully cast hints and shade until they got it.

Sometimes I wonder if things are ever that simple – if you can just say what you want to a guy without coming off as too demanding or too pushy. We spend all this time trying to get them to concede to our ways. Just scan the cover lines of your favorite women’s magazine – How to Get a Man Commit, 30 Ways to Have Him Hooked and so on and so forth. I think it all falls back on the main building block of a relationship: communication. If you ask, you shall receive…sometimes.

My homegirl Tasia FINALLY hooked up with that hot older guy that I mentioned a few weeks ago. It was everything that she hoped for. She was worried about things getting awkward and their initial friendship being ruined, but I asked her what she wanted now that things got physical. Are they bf and gf now? Or since they hung out a lot, were they already dating before?

“I don’t want a boyfriend. Just a friend…someone who I can hang out with,” she explained. She enjoyed his company and definitely got butterflies around him, but she’s not ready to make things official. She has no problem saying what she wants because she’s thought about it for a long time. And if it came down to it, she’d have no problem telling him straight up. She can ask for what she wants without playing mind games or tiptoeing around the question.

Obviously I’ve messed with all the wrong men this year – if it’s right, you should feel comfortable saying or asking for anything.

CollegeCandy, how do you ask for what you want?

When she’s not watching for Blue Ivy sightings or doing some serious Facebook creeping, Khalea moonlights as a print journalism major at the REAL HU, Howard University. Follow her on Twitter at @letsbeKHAlear, or feel free to Twatch. Whatever works for you.